Research On The Impact Of Internet Popularization On The Income Gap Between Urban And Rural Areas In China

The large gap between urban and rural development and the prominent dual structure in China have always been the prominent problems hindering the integrated development of urban and rural areas.The long-term unbalanced development will not only hinder the healthy development of economic structure,but also lead to social unrest and instability.The outline of the 14 th Five-Year Plan stated: "By 2035,the middleincome group will be significantly expanded,the development gap between urban and rural areas and between regions and the living standards of residents will be significantly narrowed,and more substantial progress will be made in the common prosperity of all people." How to implement and solve the problems of "agriculture,rural areas and farmers",stimulate farmers to increase their income,narrow the gap between urban and rural development,and promote the coordinated and integrated development of urban and rural areas are urgent problems to be solved in the current economic problems.At the same time,the advent of the era of digital economy has affected people’s way of life and work.The Internet has gradually penetrated into every aspect of people’s life,which will inevitably affect the urban-rural income gap.On the one hand,the Internet drives non-agricultural employment in rural areas and Narrows the income gap between urban and rural areas by broadening information search channels and reducing information search costs.On the other hand,there are obvious differences in infrastructure between urban and rural areas,low Internet penetration rate and backward facilities in rural areas,which are not conducive to narrowing the urban-rural income gap.So is the popularization of Internet and other communication equipment conducive to the narrowing of the urban-rural income gap? This paper will study it.In terms of theory,this paper introduces the theoretical basis and analysis of the relationship between the Internet and the urban-rural income gap,including the theory of dual economic structure,"inverted U" theory and new economic growth theory.In the aspect of theory analysis,the paper analyzes the Internet for directly influences the effect of the income gap between urban and rural areas,effects on labor transfer variable indirect effect on the income gap between urban and rural areas,as well as the Internet popularization influence spatial spillover effects of the income gap between urban and rural areas the surrounding areas,and analyses three theories respectively the article three hypotheses are put forward.In the analysis of the current situation,Arcgis is used to analyze the urban-rural income gap at the national and regional levels,and the development characteristics of the Internet are illustrated by charts.Empirical analysis,this paper selected the 251 level city,build the 2005-2018 panel data,study the influence of the Internet popularization of income gap between urban and rural areas,in the basis of regression analysis,using the POLS,RE,FE regression method found the Internet to narrow the income gap between urban and rural areas,and conducted a series of the heterogeneity of robustness test and analysis,The results of basic regression were confirmed.Then the mediation effect model was used to analyze,and the existence of the mediation effect was proved by stepwise regression method and Sobel test,and the endogeneity problem was dealt with.Finally,by constructing a spatial econometric model,this paper studies whether there is a spatial spillover effect of Internet popularization,that is,the impact on the income gap between urban and rural areas in surrounding areas.Finally,the conclusions of this paper are summarized as follows:First,Internet popularization is conducive to narrowing the urban-rural income gap,and the estimated coefficient is significant at the significance level of 1%.Looking back over time,the Internet helped to narrow the income gap more after 2011 than before.In the heterogeneity analysis,it is found that the impact of the Internet is significant in the central and western regions,but not in the eastern regions.In terms of city size,it is found that the impact of the Internet is the most significant in large cities,compared with small and medium-sized cities and megacities.Thus,hypothesis 1 of the paper is verified.Second,Internet popularization indirectly influences the urban-rural income gap by acting on labor transfer.Stepwise regression analysis shows that labor transfer has a significant mediating effect,and the mediating effect is partially mediating.Then the progressive Sobel test showed that the mediating effect was still significant and passed the relevant test.Thus verified the article hypothesis 2.Third,Internet popularization of urban and rural income gap exists significant spatial spillover effect,selecting space doberman model(SDM),the basis of regression using adjacency matrix and robustness analysis used in geographic distance matrix and regression economic nested matrix find Internet popularity not only narrow the income gap between urban and rural areas,local Moreover,it also has a positive impact on the narrowing of the urban-rural income gap in neighboring areas.This verifies hypothesis 3.Finally,relevant policy suggestions are given,including(1)continue to deepen and popularize the development of the Internet;(2)strengthen the promotion of the Internet to promote the non-agricultural employment level of rural residents;(3)Improve and develop Internet finance to enhance the level of inclusive finance in rural areas;(4)give play to the spillover effect of the Internet.It has certain reference value for related departments to narrow the income gap between urban and rural areas.